/raosxd

A tiny bootloader which rick rolls you

raosxd

A tiny bootloader which prints the first three lines of the "Never gonna give you up" refrain. It is written completely in the hex editor, using the full 512 bytes dedicated to him.

Note: There is nothing more it can do.

Screenshot

Alt Text

Boot it using QEMU

First install QEMU on your system, then run in the root folder:

  • 32 bit:
qemu-system-i386 image/boot.bin
  • 64 bit:
qemu-system-x86_64 image/boot.bin

Note: No compilation required :)

Boot it on a real machine

To run it on real hardware there are two methods to flash raosxd:

Method 1 (Terminal):

Flash the binary to a USB stick by using dd:

  • Linux:
sudo dd if=image/boot.bin of=/dev/[your usb] bs=512 status=progress

Important: Be sure you entered the right name of the usb you want the system to be on before executing this command. If you choose the wrong device your data could be damaged or wiped completely. I take no responsibility for loss of data, do it at your own risk. If you don't know what you are doing, I recommend using the qemu boot instead.

Method 2 (GUI):

Flash the latest ISO image from the releases tab to a USB stick by using programs like Balena Etcher or Rufus.

After you've flashed the bootloader select the USB in the boot menu to boot raosxd.

Source Code

If you are interested in how this thing works, you can use my hex dump tx or any other hex editor on the boot.bin file to view the code.

  • tx:
tx image/boot.bin

Credit: Rick Astley (singer of the song)